Schumann’s essay on Symphonie fantastique was an extended critique. Much of it he admired and defended from an earlier critic, but he took exception to other aspects, including the programme and the music of the final movement. He discusses the form of the first movement Allegro, viewing it as a valid alternative structure related, but not identical, to ‘the traditional model’. The debate about the validity or otherwise of Berlioz’s procedures (which were not born of ignorance or ineptitude, as some have supposed) may never reach a conclusion agreed upon by every critic and theorist, despite the music’s positive reception by audiences; the conclusion must be that whatever its eccentricities compared to academically approved models, it ‘works’ in performance.